Dan Warne of APC Magazine was at the Microsoft Tech Ed conference held recently on the Gold Coast. While he was there he went to a presentation on Windows Vista hardware requirements. It seems that while none of the news is pretty, he does mention that "... everyone will have to replace their monitors and projectors if they want to be able to watch high definition video due to Microsoft's e-e-e-evil HDCP copy protection system." The full article is here. I've put off making the jump to Linux but it looks like now might be the time.

WinFS, the filesystem which was to be used in Microsoft’s Vista but isn't anymore, is now available in Beta form to developers. It will run on WinXP SP2 but looks like it will still be in Beta form when Vista ships. Have a read of this article on Hexus and see what you think.

ViperLair went to the Elitegroup's Editors day. They have lots of info on PF88 Extreme Hybrid, SIMA cards and they have some photos to go along with the gossip.

For the Linux/nVidia users, earlier today the crew over at Linux Hardware released the 0.8 Beta of NVClock. Phronix have managed to grab a copy and put it to the test. Well, they preview it anyway.

Accelenation ponder the pros and cons of the humble Mouse, versus the Joystick. I prefer a mouse but you can read this and decide for yourselves.

Hardware Secrets follow the history of the Celeron CPU. They list all the versions and models, provide detailed specs and photos of all the Celerons released so far. Rather a handy guide.

If you're in the market for one of nVidia's 7800GTX range video cards, then you might want to read this. T-Break put the MSI, Gigabyte & Leadtek versions of this card head to head.

Guru of 3D have had a look at a Galaxy Dual BIOS GeForce 6600 GT. While its not a new card, it does carry a switchable BIOS and a buzzer alarm. The Guru will give you an overview of these features.

Dr. Robert Ing says that PC users could be the weakest link in the fight against terrorism. BonafideReviews have the article.

For the hands-free phone users, Hexus have a headset shootout using Jabra Bluetooth units.

Games are getting bigger. Some game titles for the Xbox360 will require multi-DVD packages. The sooner the Blu-ray vs HD-DVD race is won the better.

Apple and Motorola are soon expected to release an iTunes mobile phone that doubles as an MP3 player. With something in the area of 1Gb of storage, the new phone is expected to sell almost as well as the original iPod. How nice.

Need a laugh? Have a read of the Top Ten data destruction disasters. A laptop computer run over by an aeroplane? Even I could come up with a better excuse than that!

Remember that we have OCAU Quicklinks now, which are a handy way to quickly navigate around the site. They're especially useful if you're on a slow link for browsing, or a PC without your bookmarks, but I find myself using them all the time anyway.

If you're wanting to try out Opera, an alternative web browser, now might be a good time. A few people sent word that you can get an free registration code for the ad-free version of Opera, for one day only, as part of their 10 year online anniversary party. Their site is a bit slow at the moment, unsurprisingly. There's a thread here in our forums with more info. Remember, you can only get this free deal today, 30th Aug 2005 in their (American) timezone, so sometime today our time it'll stop working.

Legion Hardware compare the GeForce 7800 GT with the non-GT version of the same card. "Not only is the GeForce 7800 GT a much more affordable product, it is also far more suitable for most gaming systems". Read it here.

Many people feel that onboard audio just doesn't cut it when it comes to serious gaming. Personally, I've been using onboard audio for several years now and I see no reason to change. Either way, Creative have started to offer the Live! 24 chip as an onboard solution. Tech-Hounds check out two motherboards with the Live! 24 chip.

HardCOREware have their Portable Storage Guide Q3 2005 posted for you. The storage medium get smaller and smaller yet the capacity and speed keep increasing.

With the wrap-up of Intel’s developer forum last week, lots of promises of greater performance or vastly less power consumption were heard. Design Technica have a run down of what Intel are planning. More cores!

With VoIP technology starting to hit the main stream, beyond the business sector, Intel are working with Skype Technologies to "modify Skype's program to make it work better on new microprocessors that carry out multiple tasks simultaneously". Full article here.

Just how secure will Microsoft's Vista be? Hardware and software security will come together to isolate parts of a computer from malicious code such as viruses and worms. "The number one goal is to prevent attackers from using software tools to get at information that is at rest on the hard drive". More info here.

Who says floppy disks are of no use anymore! In this case the use of a floppy disk helped to bring a very nasty guy to justice.

Now this looks pretty funky! It's a car, sort of, or maybe its a bike. Either way its called a Moovie.

Thermalright's XP-90 was the best of the smaller CPU coolers tested in our last roundup. Not bad for an aluminium cooler - but now there's a copper version, the XP-90C. How does it compared to the previous model and the big brother of them both, the XP-120?

A potentially huge disaster is taking shape off the coast of Louisiana in the United States. Hurricane Katrina has been declared a Category 5 storm and is expected to hit New Orleans tonight our time, Monday morning their time, with catastropic effects. Our thoughts are with those who may be affected in a few hours time, and fingers crossed it won't be another disaster like the NYE Tsunami in Asia.

Been a bit quiet from me this week, I'm half-dead with the flu. But here's some snippets:

A.C.Ryan claim to have reinvented the LED fan with their new Blackfire4 DualPower range. It somehow seems logical that you shouldn't have to dim the lights when you slow down the fan; switch off the fan when you switch off the lights. More info here.

AMD have thrown down the gauntlet, challenging Intel to a dual-core duel. The challenge, issued today in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, San Jose Mercury News and The San Francisco Chronicle, features the world’s first x86 dual-core server microprocessor, the Dual-Core AMD Opteron processor, in a boxing ring waiting for the Intel challenger. More info here.

Intel unveiled their oddly-named platform brand for digital entertainment PC's. "Intel Viiv technology is our first platform designed from the ground up for the digital home, where consumers are passionate about the idea of accessing their content anytime, anywhere in their home on a number of devices," said Don MacDonald, vice president and general manager, Intel Digital Home Group. More info here.

Thermaltake released two watercooling products. First up is the Tide Water, a self-contained system for cooling a video card. Second is Silent Water, an all-in-one CPU watercooling kit.

Slightly offtopic:

Decker sent word of a VNV NATION tour in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. VNV NATION has emerged in the past few years to become a powerhouse performer in the electronic dance scene, and their first Australian tour - to promote their brand-new album, "Matter + Form" - will give Australian fans a taste of what Europe and America has kept secret for so long. Details here.

Intel, who own more than 80 percent of the x86 desktop processor market, wants to stay on top. They plan to run over AMD with Performance per Watt, Intel’s latest catch phrase.

At the ECS Editor's Day held in San Jose, motherboard partner ATI was on hand to showcase their upcoming CrossFire technology. PC Perspective were able to get some information on ECS' upcoming CrossFire motherboards.

The TechZone show you how to speed up your computer without upgrading. Pretty basic stuff but it may be of use to some.

Bit-Tech have the scoop on the best Case Mod I've seen in ages. I mean its really cool. I like it because it has a cow! I like cows and anyone who can get one onto/into their PC deserves a round of applause.

Daviesh points out that another P2P site has been shut down, this time its The Realworld. Fans have called it the best online VCR ever. There really isn't much hope for these sites. The legal risks are too great and it can be a very expensive business.

Several people sent in links to pages showing tweaks for Googles new Gtalk. I found this page which has some of the better ones and also some links to other sites. Thanks guys.

The US military is going all Star Wars. They are well on the way to developing an aircraft mounted laser gun. "... it has managed to shrink all the hardware for such a weapon so that it can fit under the wing of a fighter jet or piggyback on a vehicle to zap anything from ground-to-air and air-to-air missiles to rocket-propelled grenades."This Article on New Scientist gives all the good info. Thanks Iroquois and QLH454.

Iroquois also notes that Microsoft look to be set to make a Halo Movie. I wonder who gets to play the Master Chief?

Satellite technology is wonderful stuff. It lets us do all sorts of things, like tracking crocodiles. I need to get one of those attached to my kids. Thanks to von Stalhein for the link.

DVHardware note that AMD's dual-core mobile Turion 64 processors are set for launch in early 2006. The dual-core Turion 64 features the Socket S1 with 638 pins and will be AMD's first CPU with Pacifica Virtualization Technology. Sounds nasty!

With the launch of Google Talk this week, perhaps people should be reminded of other IM programs available. PC Mechanic check out the newest version of Trillian and tackle its pros and cons.

Ambush lets us know that the new SATA 2.5 specs have been released. "The new SATA 2.5 spec is an aggregation of seven others, all rolled into one, aimed more at people building the devices and systems rather than the end users."

Spec83 found a handy little utility called Centrino Hardware Control. "A really good program for managing an Intel based laptop (soon to be AMD compatible too). Features voltages controls, fan controls, hard drive spin up rates and ATI clock adjustments as well as temp monitoring and battery life calculations." Its still a beta but you can find it here.

What would life be like without the Internet? I can almost remember those days. The TechZone go a week without Net access. How did he survive?

Users of MSN should have a read of this. Some info about a new Messenger Worm, called Kelvir.HI, which operates in a variety of different languages.

About half of the people who sign up for a Telstra Broadband plan change to a more expensive plan at some later date. "Telstra said it was signing around 20,000 customers per week to BigPond broadband services." I guess they upgrade their plan when the excess charges arrive.

Web Masters and site owners should take note that a serious flaw in PHP has been uncovered. The site has links to an upgrade to fix the problem.

Hollywood studios lawyers are handing out lawsuits again, this time to people using the BitTorrent technology to swap files. "Internet movie thieves be warned: You have no friends in the online community when you are engaging in copyright theft". Read more here.

The humble power button will undergo a change when Microsoft’s Vista arrives on the scene. Apart from the standard On and Off options there will be something new!

If you like riddles, you'll love this site. I don't like riddles as it seems they don't like me. I've lost the post with the name of whoever sent the link in, but thanks.

Kim sent this one in just for fun. Have a look at The Dialectizer. Take a webpage and translate it to a dialect which can be chosen from a list of redneck, jive, cockney, elmer fudd, swedish chef and more. It makes my news posts almost readable!

Google Talk! Tried it yet? I installed it last night and gave it a small workout. It seems to do the job rather well. Text, Voice (VoIP) or Email (Gmail) ... take your pick. You don't need a dedicated headset to use Google Talk, just a computer microphone and speakers will do the job for VoIP. The text side of GTalk will interface with other IM programs such as Miranda, Trillian Pro, iChat, GAIM and Psi. It's based on the Jabber/XMPP protocol with plans to support SIP in a future release so I'm guessing that any compatible client will be able to interact with Google Talk. Although there is no support for Mac or Linux at this stage, GTalk is a beta, with more features planned for the future. You can have multiple calls underway at once, but only one can be active at a time. The other calls will be on hold. For now, you need to have a Gmail account to signup for it but these days most people do. Its only a small (900K) download and it sits in the task bar as with any other IM program. Very simple to setup and install and best of all, its free. Go to www.google.com/talk and give it a try. I did. There is a forum thread going if you have something to say about it. Thanks to the many people who sent this to the news box. By the looks of things, there are going to be a lot of GTalk users. Search for Mred32 and add me to your list. If you annoy me too much I'll simply block you :)

In other news this morning ...
CoolTechZone have an interview with OCZ Technology, the well known memory manufacturer. They discuss things like their recently launched Gamer GX series and the future of the memory industry.

The TechZone have 10 Reasons why you should adopt Linux. I could probably provide you with about ten more yet, I still haven't taken the plunge.

How to quickly improve your computer's performance. That’s the title of an article posted at Bona Fide Reviews. In my case, "buy a new one" would do the job well.

PC Perspective have posted some of the slides from yesterdays IDF presentation where Intel debuted their new micro-architecture to the world. They cover the information presented in the slides as well as some additional data floating around.

If you haven't yet heard about CE-ATA then this article might be worth a read. CE-ATA is a new Hard Drive standard for targeted towards consumer electronics products. It might be coming to a beige box near you.

Another article about publishers rights and the rights of individuals. "With the pending arrival of Intel's East Fork and Microsoft's Vista, the end user will be further deprived of his fair use rights to line the pockets of the publishers." Full article here.

Setting up a dual display system is not always as simple as it could be. Bigbruin give you a rundown on how to go about it. I don't think I could go back to a single screen system. Multi-screen goodness for me.

TweakTown get all wet over the latest water cooling goodies from the likes of Corsair, Thermaltake and Gigabyte. They put them all inside the ring to find out which offers the best overall features and cooling performance. If you're in the market for a new CPU cooling solution which offers better performance than air coolers to aid in higher overclocking and quieter operation at the same time, read this and find out which one is the better deal.

This week seems to be a big week for Power Supplies. Lots of new models reviewed and released. Pureoverclock have a round-up of four PSUs including an Enermax Noisetaker 600, PC Power & Cooling Turbo-Cool 510 SLI, Seasonic S12 600 and the Silverstone Zeus ST65ZF 650. Give it a read.

Elpida today announced its next-generation DDR3 SDRAM memory chips for future notebooks, desktop PCs and servers. The new DDR3 architecture will feature a high-speed data transfer of up to 1333MHz, which is double the speed of the current DDR2 architecture in volume production. DvHardware have the scoop!

Zapper fish sent this in. What is Google planning to do with US$4 Billion? Is MSN about to get some competition? Have a read and find out. Do people still use MSN? Weird.

Intel are planning to do away with different CPUs for different platforms, and merge them into a common architecture.

In the mean time, PC Mechanic have posted a Mobile CPU Overview. Turions, Centrinos, and Mobile CPUs - Oh My!

Have you tried OCAU's Wiki? Lots of handy info and links. OneArmedMan points out that Wikipedia need donations to help keep them alive. So if you have a dollar spare, maybe throw it their way.

After all the rumors, Canon has finally released the new Canon EOS 5D Digital Camera. Featuring a full frame 12.8 megapixel CMOS sensor, true spot metering and a magnesium alloy exterior, this camera has everything I want ... except for the US$3300 price tag. There is some discussion about it and the other new release goodies in our forums.

Bit-Tech have a round-up of some toys which have been sent their way. A backlit EL keyboard, a dual-tuner TV card and a new modular PSU from Tagan, as well as some PSP accessories. Have a look.

DRM and High-Def video are things which people will need to think about before installing the next Windows version, Vista. Ars Technica have a run down of what it all means.

On the topic of Windows Vista, CoolTechZone have posted an overview of this wonderful new Windows version. I can't wait! (insert sarcasm here)

Over on Bigbruin you can find a guide to some of the more common Windows Keyboard Shortcuts. There are dozens of common Windows shortcuts, and some related to specific software titles. Memorizing just a few of the more basic ones may be worth the time-savings they can offer.

Can we really end illegal music downloading? Do we need to? WindowsAtoZ ask these questions and ponder the answers.

A.G.System notes that the new 77.77 WHQL drivers are now available from nVidia. New drivers are a good thing, most of the time.

If you are like me and try to avoid walking or generally using your legs, then this might be for you. "Internet users will soon be able to walk the streets of New York and other cities — without leaving their seat." Read it here. Thanks Ocelotx.

For those with huge power needs, how about a 1000W PSU for your system. I'm not sure what you might do with that much power but I guess you could just fill a box with extra hard drives and lots of flashy things. Thanks Sniper.

CoolTechZone note that the X800GT BIOS Update boosts performance by up to 7%. Not bad for a free upgrade.

OMAGAN sends word of some info and screenshots of UT2007. Fans of the series will be keen to have a look at the next installment.

USA Today mention that the Google Desktop search utility has been upgraded. "The latest Google offering includes several twists. Beyond providing search results, it monitors the user's behavior and presents relevant information in a resizable and moveable vertical window called the Sidebar."

For the Rev-Heads, another Dyno Day has been arranged in Sydney. Have a read of this forum thread to get all the details. Thanks Ben.

BFOlan is on again in Adelaide. Its set for the 17th of September and you can check out all the info at the BFOlan site.

The timewaster for the day is ... very silly. Damn me and my colour blindness. I can't get past the first level because I cant see the difference between the green and the yellow. Give it a go.

If you suddenly find you can't post or reply in the forums, most likely you need to update your email address in UserCP and respond to the confirmation email the system sends you. You will then be able to post again and, if you're a full Member, you will be able to see the trading forums again within an hour.

Even if your forum permissions are ok, please take a moment to check your email address is up to date - thanks! We receive thousands of bounced emails every day now, from people not keeping their forum settings up to date.

AMD introduced two new models in their Turion 64 processor range. The technology is designed to be the most advanced family of 32- and 64-bit Windows®-compatible processors available for mobile PCs, enabling thinner and lighter notebooks plus compatibility with today’s most popular wireless and graphics solutions. More info here.

Gigabyte Australia launched some new SLI motherboards. The new SLI-ready motherboards are the GA-K8N-SLI and GA-8N-SLI Pro that feature compatibility with new dual core processors from Intel® or AMD, Serial ATA 3Gb/s, NV RAID, NV firewall and Gigabit LAN connectivity, all for a retail price that is expected to start at less than AU$190. More info in a 174KB DOC here.

Western Digital announced the availability of a new 400GB SATA hard drive with 16MB cache. With 7,200 RPM spindle speed, native SATA technology and 16 MB cache, the new desktop-class WD Caviar SE16 400 GB hard drives are ideal for graphic design, video editing, gaming, advanced business computing and other high-end desktop applications. More info here.

Zensonic have provided updated info on their much-anticipated Z500 Networked DVD Media Player. The Z500 has been designed from the ground up to meet the needs of home theatre enthusiasts, including multiple fully digital A/V outputs and a backlit remote control. More info on the Z500 website here and in a 40KB PDF here.

DNS issues on the weekend have left our news box a little bare.. feel free to send anything of interest to news@overclockers.com.au. I'll see what I can dig up in the meantime:

Chocoholics in NSW will be happy to hear that Mars and Snickers bars are back on the market again, having been removed a few weeks ago due to an extortion threat.

OCNZ have a 3-way roundup of 7800GTX video cards. In this round up, we will also take pricing, warranty, bundle value and ease of use into consideration, due to the physical similarities between the 7800GTX cards.

A recent study suggests violent video games make children aggressive. Another study showed that playing video games using flame-throwers and automatic weapons made them more "mean and angry" afterwards. Sounds very scientific. Reading articles like that makes me aggressive..

Xbit looked at two memory kits from G.Skill. We would like to introduce to you memory solutions from the Taiwanese G.SKILL company targeted for extreme overclockers.

Markoff has an article about the supercomputer race, as the market for serious numbercrunching enlarges. Procter & Gamble used a supercomputer to study the airflow over its Pringles potato chips to help stop them from fluttering off the company's assembly lines.

ExtremeTech wonder if sound cards are on the way out. I haven't bought a new sound card since the SoundBlaster Live! days - in fact I've mostly been using onboard sound since then. I may be cloth-eared but it all sounds the same through headphones to me. If you feel differently, TomsHardware have a review of Creative's latest card, the X-Fi, that might interest you.

3DProfessor examined the NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 workstation card. How does it perform against its predecessor? Read on and be prepared to be completely blown away; these results even beat the SLI results posted only a few months back!

From Viljar: A couple of weeks ago ABC reported that ANSTO had decided to allow pictures of Lucas Heights to remain on Google Earth. But today on ABC news radio a representative from ANSTO repeated that they wish for the images to be blurred. Mixed signals, then. For Lucas Heights and countless other Australian Google Maps links, see our Wiki page full of them.

Bern lets us know that Slashdot has information that Japan's Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications is planning to create "virtual reality" High-Defintition 3-D TV which will allow you to smell and even touch objects in the 3-D space. Full article here.

Rojak Pot has a new article posted up on their site about the Secret Overclocking in Asus Motherboards.

Xbitlabs has continued their detailed round-up of 17" flat-panel monitors. They cover 16 displays from LG, Samsung, Sony, Viewsonic, Mitsubishi, NEC and a few others.

Apparently the first dual-core Pentium 4 was rush job, Intel even admitted recently at a conference today. Thanks for the info Nick!

For anyone running PowerChute Business Edition version 6.x, you must upgrade to 7.x due to Java Runtime Environment expiration. Customers running PowerChute Business Edition 6.x after July 27, 2005 will encounter service failures\hanging on their next reboot. More information here. Thanks for the heads-up Tom.

Darklord sends in news about computer characters being mugged in a virtual crime spree. A man has been arrested in Japan on suspicion carrying out a virtual mugging spree by using software "bots" to beat up and rob characters in the online computer game Lineage II. The stolen virtual possessions were then exchanged for real cash.

BigBruin shows us some good accessories and toys that you might like to treat your laptop with.

PCMech has an indepth look at nVidia's SLI Technology and how this invention has changed the videocard market.

Bona Fide Reviews informs us about the future of cell phone viruses. Antivirus experts say it is possible and are questioning whether personal data entered into cell phones and PDA’s can be stolen or infested now that minor security incidents are already being reported.

Outonanisland shares with us a screensaver which he says is an awesome screensaver (43MB) of a four cylinder engine being built. (Edit: Mirror here, because the original site seems to have bandwidth issues. An exe inside the zip installs it. Being an exe you might want to have your virus/spyware stuff in full paranoid mode, but no alerts here.)

This one nearly slipped past me. A pirated version of MacOS for x86 is available for install. I never seems to take a determined mind long to get around most of the security measures put in place. "Apple has announced that Mac OS X will run on Intel's x86 architecture chips starting in 2006." I didn't know that!

Something interesting sent in by apap100. "Pluto is the only all-in-one solution for your home that seamlessly combines media & entertainment, home automation, security, telecom and computing." Nice sales pitch.

Ars Technica take you through the basics of editing your digital images. "We'll cover a number of goals like adjusting contrast, warming images up and reducing noise from shadows in a more accurate and controlled way. Then we'll get into advanced stuff like masking but all explained in an almost-too friendly, "why are you touching my arm?" sort of way." Read it here.

TechSpot have an ATI Graphics round-up. They cover ten ATI solutions that go from its current flagship, the X850 XT PE, down to the value market with the X300 and X300SE.

Futurelooks check out some net-freebies for tuning up your machine online.

Question: What can you do with an Unisys ES7000 32 CPU/32 GB RAM Server with Microsoft Windows 2003 Datacenter Edition running on it? Answer. Thanks Morgan.

In what way does technology effect humans and their daily lives? Here is one persons take on it.

Hardware Secrets have posted a Power Supply Tutorial. Everything you need to know about power supplies, including types, how to calculate its true power, efficiency, power factor correction (PFC) and more.

Bit-Tech are looking at a pre-production sample of the new SLI small form factor system from Shuttle. Fancy two 6800GTs cooled by heatpipes in your SFF? Look here.

A call for help from Dark_Greg. "I am currently writing/directing a star wars fan film. The film is going to be largely CGI, with only the barest of minimum sets built. We currently have plenty of acting talent but we are in need of artists, specifically people good at hand drawing concepts as well as 3D artists (conceptual or otherwise) to help move the creative process along. We have a few FX test stills, and one nearly complete CGI model up, but members of the art team are thin on the ground. Anyone who can offer help in this area would be greatly appreciated. We are also after musical composers, and sound effects people to help out, with some jobs coming up with a pitch video we are putting together to show off what we have done to prospective sponsors. Anyone who can help, or knows people who can help are encouraged to contact me. Due to the nature of fan films, and our lack of funding, all work done will need to be purely voluntary, with the most we can offer being small amounts of advertising on our website and credits in the film. Our website is here and I can be contacted there [the website]." There is a forum thread about it also. Good luck.

PC Perspective have posted a quick preview of the upcoming Asus 7800 GTX TOP (Top Overclocking Performance) video card. It is the first real change to the reference board design we have seen. It reverts back to a two slot cooling mechanism which is apparently more efficient and is also much quieter. Though the default clock speeds are about the highest seen from any retail card, they were able to overclock it to 511 MHz core and 1.42 GHz memory!!

Is ATI's X800GT competition for Nvidia’s 6600GT? Or is it just too late. Article at CoolTechZone.

Nvidia scientist have called for more research into parallelism. "If we look at the situation of general-purpose CPUs," Kirk said, "we see architects moving rapidly to multithreading and multicore designs. But we don't see a lot more threads to run."

Adrian's Rojak Pot have just posted the The ASUS PEG Link Mode Guide. "It's been just over a year since ASUS was forced to officially announce the PEG Link Mode. Unfortunately, very little is known about it till today. That's what we intend to correct today. After digging deeper into the mystery of PEG Link Mode, we are proud to present our report on what it actually does!"

Old laptops must be rare and in great demand in the USA. In the crush to secure one of 1000 four year old Mac laptops selling cheap, 17 people were injured and four needed hospital treatment. That’s just weird!

More on the weird front, a Singapore scientific institute said it has invented a urine-powered micro battery. Although they intend it to be used for medical purposes, I can see a few other uses also. Thanks Brett.

Iain sent in the flash timewaster for the day. It carries on with today’s "weird stuff" theme really well. Tetka!"you can tweak it with your mouse".

After some technical difficulties through the night which required Overclockers Australia to be taken down, we're back up! Mind you, we are running in "Limping Along" mode for the moment. All should be back to full speed soon'ish.

Dan has more letters posted. In this issue: Games on plasma, computing on TVs, hairy heat sinks, low cost SAN, and Amiga data transfer.

For those that haven't noticed, Apple has the Doom movie trailer up on their site for us to see. Thanks for the heads-up Belgregor.

On the same note, The Tech Lounge has some Doom Movie coverage from QuakeCon posted up on their site. Techreport also have a write-up from John Carmack's speech at QuakeCon.

Neevo shares with us what they can buy over in the UK: a Revenge CD that you can use to get back at your neighbours. Could definitely have some fun with that CD hooked up to the right sound system. =)

Driverheaven have the new official Catalyst 5.8 CCC drivers available. The set weigh in at 33Mb. They also have a guide for those contemplating building a new media centre PC. Check it out here.

BonafideReviews has some information about VoIP Phones and how much bandwidth they use.

Remember those Floppy Disk Drives that we used to use last millennium? Well, if you ever have wondered how they work, Hardware Secrets have all the answers.

Techreport have an article posted comparing different dual-core-capable Pentium platforms.

Hexus have two new guides posted, the first one tells us all about Wireless networking, and the second one about Codecs. Hexus also have an interview with John Bruno, ATI ASIC Design Manager for their Chipset Division. Lots of insight into the world of chip design in this article.

Once again HDAudioVisual have some goodies to give away in the forums - you can win one of three Arctic Cooling Freezer CPU coolers. See this thread for details!

Intel will apparently reveal the next generation of its multicore CPUs at the upcoming developer forum. As already expected, the general move will be away from NetBurst (P4, Xeon) and towards the Pentium-M architecture.

VR-Zone have a hefty DDR2 roundup, with products from Toki, Crucial, Kingston and Corsair.

Darklord sends us in a link, which possibly takes virtual reality to a whole different level. By remotely stimulating a person's vestibular system - the fluid-filled tubes in the inner ear that guide their sense of balance - with electrodes placed on the skin just below the ear, researchers at NTT's research laboratories in Kanagawa have found a way to turn humans into oversized radio controlled vehicles.

For those Stargate fans that were upset to hear about the SG-1 videogame being cancelled, you can now be happy again. The development of the game will still continue uninterrupted at Perception's Sydney studio. Thanks carney.

Engadget has a guide posted on playing movies on your iPod Photo. Thanks for the link Eroda!

Lots of people sent in news that Mac OS X for Intel leaked onto the web early Thursday. Although many believed it was only a matter of time before such a leak occurred, Apple had taken stringent measures to ensure the Intel version of its operating system stayed locked down...

Lots of sites have visited QuakeCon 2005, and have their reports up of the first day of the 6000 player LAN/expo. Reviews on The Tech Zone, Bjorn3d, and Legit Reviews.

Logitech have released their new G15 Keyboard, which is just simply amazing. It has a built in LCD display, programmable keys, adjustable tilt, and the LCD even has a backlight! More on the keyboard here, and here.

CoolTechZone has a writeup posted on OLED Technology, and why millions of dollars each year is being poured in OLED research.

Lots of space stuff going on lately! I just noticed that it's only about 10 minutes until NASA launches the Mars Orbiter, aboard an Atlas 5 rocket. NASA TV has footage. There's a thread here in our Current Events forum for this launch.

NVIDIA have unveiled the second member of their GeForce 7800 series of video cards, the GeForce 7800GT. Based on the award-winning GeForce 7800 GTX architecture, this new GPU brings support for next-generation gaming technologies - including Shader Model 3.0, high-dynamic range (HDR) lighting, and NVIDIA Scalable Link Interface (SLI) multi-GPU technology - to lower price points.

Australia's Attorney General released a discussion paper on combatting the unauthorised use of photographs on the internet. "Recent media reports of photographs secretly being taken of children at sporting events and then posted on the internet has highlighted the problem and the fact it is being facilitated by the common use of digital photography, internet distribution and mobile phone cameras," Mr Ruddock said. More info in this 57KB PDF.

Altech Computers sent word that they now carry the Thecus range of network-attached storage. The N4100 is a world-class terabyte-level network storage appliance with SATA technology and Gigabit Ethernet connectivity. The device also provides RAID 0, 1, 5, JBOD support and energy-savings of more than 35%. There's product pics in black and silver, and more info in this 1.4MB DOC.

ASUS introduced some high-gain antennas for extension of WLAN signal coverage. While the WL-ANT150 omni-directional antenna extends coverage area to all direction for overall network enhancement, the WL-ANT168 directional antenna can focus signal range to certain directions to really drive wireless signal to hard-to-reach corners. More info here.

Cooler Master have a new CPU cooler, the Hyper 6+. This super silent CPU cooler, with heat-pipe technology, successfully takes heat away. And its 100mm fan provides mass airflow and high air pressure to maximum heat dissipation. The powerful and quiet operation of the Hyper 6+ supports the latest Prescott LGA775, Pentium® 4, AMD’s K8 and K7. More info here.

Have you ever been pinged by a Speed Camera? The NSW Roads and Traffic Authority yesterday admitted that it could not prove the authenticity of the pictures taken by these cameras. Sydney magistrate Lawrence Lawson threw out a speeding case after the RTA said it had no evidence that an image from a camera had not been doctored. Full article here.

Still on the car theme, how about a TFT screen rearview mirror. I don't know how legal these would be but as Neevo notes, "I bet it isn’t long before someone is caught watching a porno". That adds new meaning to having dangly bits on the rear view mirror.

Desktop eye candy. Do we want it, or need it? With the beta release of Windows Vista, it looks as if Microsoft is starting to catch up to the current leader in Desktop Bling, Mac OSX. So where does this leave Linux? Driverheaven investigate whether Linux's leading desktops have the ability to follow suit.

A couple of news bites from avid newshound Eroda. Apple Computer have been unable to patent the menu-based software interface of its popular iPod digital music player. Someone else beat them to it. Perhaps they should try to patent it as a portable games machine instead.

Bigbruin take us on a basic tour of SCSI hard drives. SCSI may not be an economical solution for a desktop computer, but it doesn't pretend to be. The high price tag comes with equally high performance and reliability, and in critical server and workstation applications, the added expense may easily be justified and recovered in a short period of time.

Futurelooks checks out some technologies for the Kitchen of the Future. I struggle to survive in a kitchen of the past!

On August 11th, today, nVidia deliver "The Power of 3". But what does it mean? I don't know, but the folks at The Tech Lounge have been asking questions.

PCstats have posted a preview of the new VIA C7-M Processor. Its set to be primarily for mobile use but I'm sure the modding crowd will find other uses for it.

Thanks to the unnamed person who sent this in. An Anti-Microsoft group has plans to sue Microsoft for selling a defective product. "It is unacceptable corporate behavior. Over four years after Windows XP was released I still receive regular updates and bug fixes". This should be interesting, or at least entertaining.

TrustedReviews check out a new RPG for the PC called Fate. "The overarching plot could be summed up as ‘There’s a big evil bugger lurking on level 47, would you mind killing it?’ That’s it. It’s as easy and as simple as that." Sounds like my kind of RPG.

Hardware Analysis check out the new X-fi soundcard from Creative Labs to see why it comes with such a hefty price tag. Is it truly a leap in audio performance, or just a leap in soundcard pricing?

PC World have a brief roundup of Ten DVD Drives including both internal and external units.

Dan has been playing around with silly ideas again, this time he ponders the possibility of building a computer which knows everything about everything !

Hexus have a short post about Data Recovery Services. Having a hard drive crash or a CD/DVD which can't be read is often more than just a pain in the proverbial. I think that since we all do our regular backups then these services won't be needed at all. Hmm, when did I last run a backup?

ExtremeTech discuss Chipsets. Current chipsets, future chipsets and the pro's and cons of each. Past present and future.

Telstra are about to launch a new wireless broadband service aimed at small businesses and consumers. "By November 2005, Telstra Mobile Broadband will reach 6.3 million people nationally, translating into more than 33 per cent of the population." There is a thread about it on our Forums.

Here's an interesting one. It seems that Google CEO Eric Schmidt doesn't like people "checking him out". Online news site CNet have been banned by Google after they published some information about him.

Scott Richter, one of the three biggest spammers in the world, has been slugged with a US$7 Million bill, but unfortunately, the money is going to Bill. "I am committed to sending e-mail only to those who have requested it...". Yea right.

Gabe Newell, head honcho at Valve Software, airs his concerns about the problems with writing game code for multicore processors. "If writing in-order code [in terms of difficulty] is a one and writing out-of-order code is a four, then writing multicore code is a 10." Read the full article here.

For those eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Xbox360, The Inquirer have a bit of information about what you might be able to connect it to.

Posting photos of children on websites could become a crime, even if they appear to be wholesome family snaps. Another case of over zealous Government silliness in my opinion.

First up tonight, news that we have broken our record for the most people online on our forums. Most users ever online was 829, Today at 10:20 PM. Also, the landing of Discovery was successful, with the flight crew just exiting the shuttle now.

Cisco is perhaps going to buy Nokia Mobiles soon, in a bid to gain their wireless infrastructure technology. Thanks for the heads-up browca04.

Found this pretty cool 'gadget'. A mirror with a built-in monitor and TV. You can view your favourite TV programmes or your computer display while studying your own reflection. Brilliant!

PCStats thought it would be interesting to see how overclocking is affected on the WindowsXP x64 Edition platform by illustrating both 32-bit and 64-bit benchmarks for an AMD Athlon64 4000+ based system. Check out the full article here.

Antonio sends in news about the possibility of Open source getting taxed in the future, to prevent tax evaders.

A few people sent in news that although Microsoft had fixed up the security for Windows Genuine Advantage, about 3 or 4 days later it has been bypassed again.

CoolTechZone have a writeup on Blu-Ray and how it relates to our current storage solutions.

Bit-Tech have a look at the new singleplayer demo of F.E.A.R that was released last week. They also test out the game on a variety of different graphics hardware.

Ok, NASA has just issued a "go for de-orbit burn", so in about 10 minutes the orbiting space shuttle Discovery will fire its maneuvering thrusters and begin the descent back to earth, landing in about an hour or so. Keep on top of the latest news in this thread, NASA's mission page and NASA TV.

Fans of the Stargate-SG1 series might be disappointed to hear that work on the game title has been cancelled. “The title in its current form, initially scheduled for an October 2005 release, does satisfy neither our quality requirements nor the fans expectations. We will not release anything that does not do justice to this well known license”. Thanks for the heads up Charliebrownau.

The future of fashion is under discussion at DesighnTechnica. "...as well as a skirt, from Gemma Shusterman, with motors that turned the skirt’s accents into cat toys to illustrate the predator/prey relationship." Read it and weep!

BonaFideReviews have just posted an article about dust in your computer and how big of an effect it has on performance. Personally, I find that a nice layer of dust is essential for a well running system. Remove the dust and the computer crashes!

Bytesector interview the Canadian Halo 2 Champion. They also had a few games of Halo2 with him and got their tail whipped. I had a few games with my son today, and lost 19 to 1. The XBox really needs a mouse!

Eroda found this interesting piece of info about a new HD Video system using an Ultra High Definition Video signal. 18 minutes of UHDV video consumes 3.5 terabytes of data. Time to upgrade those hard drives again.

Will VoIP (Voice over IP) eventually take over from conventional voice telecommunications?. That’s the question asked in this article over at Bigbruin in the USA.

CoolTechZone want to tell you all about Cell Microprocessor Architecture. "Nothing has created more media hype and anticipation than the next generation of gaming consoles from Microsoft (Xbox 360) and Sony (PlayStation 3). At the recently concluded E3 tradeshow, both of these devices were showcased to the audience and amazing promises were made to potential buyers." While you're there they also have a go at explaining Digital Television (DTV) and how it works.

I'm not sure what Jason was doing on the US based Police Families website, but he did notice this interesting post. Perhaps they are looking for alternate ways of raising revenue? Thanks Jason.

Adrian's Rojak Pot have added a few more options to the BIOS Optimization Guide. These are HDD Self Diagnostic, IOAPIC Enable and MAC Media Interface.

Need a web host? The TechZone show you how to choose a good web hosting company.

Just over a week has gone by in our latest Folding Giveaway, the State of Origin Shoot Out. Represent your state, help OCAU stay #1 and help research cures for some really nasty diseases.. all by running a simple background program on your PC.

The Space Shuttle Discovery will begin the sequence to re-enter Earth's atmosphere in about 45 minutes from now, with landing scheduled in a little over 90 minutes. This is the first re-entry by a Shuttle since Columbia was destroyed during re-entry in 2003, with the loss of all seven crew.

As always you can keep track of things here in our Forums and NASA's "Return to Flight" mission page. If you have broadband, tune into NASA TV for live streaming footage. One interesting view that we will hopefully share via NASA TV will be footage from the International Space Station as Discovery streaks into the atmosphere below it.

Edit: weather delay, so still a couple of hours off. stay tuned to this thread for info.
Edit: waved off for 24h due to weather, bah.

Voice over IP, or VoIP, is one of the latest buzzwords, but not that many people know what it's all about. Enthalpy has checked out a new kit from Engin that aims to make it easy for anyone to use, and enjoy cheap phone calls over the internet:

Here's some more historical catchup. If you're interested in the previous Five Years Ago on OCAU newsposts, they're here, here and here.

We're only up to October 1999 so far, so actually it's nearly Six Years Ago! On the 12th of October 1999 much of Sydney's CBD lost power due to a fire in a distribution centre, which made for an exciting day at work, especially with only a few months left of the "Y2K is approaching!" panic. Meanwhile, I was still playing around with various mendocino Celerons, but P3-450's @ 600MHz were another popular overclock. The first-generation (Slot A) Athlons were rare, with some hardcore guys getting their 600/650 units to over 800MHz. Overclocking Athlons was tricky, because the "Golden Finger Devices" hadn't appeared yet. We still had to deal with a poor selection of PCI/AGP divisors, with high FSB overclocks throwing the PCI and AGP speeds out of whack, corrupting HDD data and in some cases frying video cards. As I recall, most of my spare time was sucked up by the game Driver. :)

We had our first motherboard review, of the AOpen AX6BC Pro, a Slot1 board that we commended for stability and reliability. Amazingly, it was only about a year ago that I replaced that board in my (then) girlfriend's PC. Not because the board died, but because she wanted a faster CPU!

I know a lot of this stuff looks really ghetto nowadays, but it was cutting-edge at the time. In fact, many of the commercial products we see nowadays are extensions on ideas dreamed up by hobbyists in the past. Anyway, on the 20th of October 1999 I noted a petition (all links dead now) about Intel's supposed anti-competitive practises involving the supply of BX chipsets to Athlon motherboard manufacturers. Interesting stuff with AMD's recent lawsuit against Intel. Nick Arrowsmith sent in his nutty P2 @ 140MHz FSB.. he actually emailed me a couple of months ago, having upgraded to an Athlon64 4000+. Nice to hear. :)

One other cool thing from October 1999 was the opening of our Forums, in their very first incarnation, on the 26th. Who would have known they'd turn into the monster they are today. :)

OCWorkbench compare a pair of 6600LEs on SLI mode, with a 6600GT. Check out the full article, here.

Apple has announced that they will be releasing Mobile Phones soon. The latest word on the grapevine has the device launching at the V Festival on 21 August, with Virgin Mobile acting as the UK carrier for the download service.

Austrian Video game publisher, JoWood has scrapped the Stargate SG-1 Video game, and terminated the company's relationship with developer 'Perception'.

Sierra has annouced that F.E.A.R single player demo is going to be released within the next few days. There is a discussion about this in our Games forum, here. Edit: Brent has pointed out that it has been released over at Gamearena, and Ausgamers.

Bit-Tech have a play with Windows Vista. We cover some of the technology behind the Beta, as well as more mundane things like the new Installer and the new security features included. There's a look at the new interface, using Aero, as well as our opinions on the new IE7. Check out the full article, here.

Mushkin have apparently beefed up their heatsink design for their top memory modules. Adrian's Rojak Pot has more information on their site.

A dilemma we must have all faced at least once, trying to get that new hard drive working in your friend's old computer. Well, Hardware Secrets has a guide posted up that will help you overcome that problem.

On the same topic as Hard Drives, Hardware secrets also strip down a Hard Drive and show us how the main components work.

I found this pretty neat guide showing you how to make your own MP3 Player. Pretty damn cool!

Firstly, a special greeting to Astron Telecommunications, whose Indian telemarketing centre has rung me six times in the last two days, despite me asking to be removed from their database every time they rang. One of the calls came while I was on the phone to the Australian Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman, lodging a complaint about them. It's been suggested that registering your details on the Do Not Contact opt-out page on the Australian Direct Marketing Association is a way to reduce these annoying calls, so I've now done that and time will tell. The main thing that gets me about these calls is that they're coming from India via (I assume) super-high-compression VoIP internet telephony. So the extremely poor quality of the line, coupled with the accent of the person making the call, makes the sales pitch almost indecipherable. And what are they selling? Telecommunications! Marketing at its best.

Anyway, on with the press releases:

AMD launched the AMD Opteron 100 Series with ECC unbuffered memory support. Based on overwhelming customer demand in an increasing number of critical markets for one-way servers and workstations, AMD is expanding the types of memory supported by the AMD Opteron 100 Series processors. More info here. They also expanded the AMD Athlon 64 X2 dual-core processor line to include a 3800+ model that we've seen several reviews of in the last few days.

Cooler Master released a new heatpipe-based chipset cooler. CM Blue Ice is designed to cool down the temperature of Northbridge chipset and surrounding components. More info here.

Cooltech, an Italian watercooling component manufacturer, announced some new products. We are proud to introduce our new products for PC watercooling. More info here.

Western Digital have increased the warranty on some of their hard drive products. WD desktop and notebook hard drives, including WD Scorpio, WD Caviar, WD Caviar SE and WD Caviar SE16 drive families, manufactured or purchased on June 1, 2005, or later are now covered by WD’s 3-year warranty. The company’s enterprise drives, including WD Raptor and WD Caviar RE, are now supported with its 5-year warranty beginning the same date. More info here.

Finally, Mitch01 send in Teagames.com which has a few flash timewasters, to kill those few precious minutes before Friday-afternoon-pub time.

Edit: ANOTHER CALL. FOUR TIMES TODAY! **^%#$*&^%#$*%(*&%^*$^!!
Edit: five.

There was a successful spacewalk to remove some gap-filling padding from between the heat-shielding tiles on the underside of the orbiting Shuttle Discovery last night. I actually watched much of the spacewalk on NASA TV. How cool is it that we can see, live across the internet, what an Astronaut sees as he conducts a repair mission on the shuttle, in orbit, suspended on the end of a huge crane from the International Space Station? Amazing stuff.

Ezee spotted more concerns about monitors on Vista. According to a US tech consultant Stephen Speicher, Vista will make protected digital content all fuzzy unless it is viewed on high bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP) compatible monitor.

OMAGAN spotted this amusing Guide to BF2 on SomethingAwful. Do not risk other teammates to the perils of being shot down in a fiery explosion; get in transport choppers and leave your base without anybody on board! The weight of additional passengers will simply slow you down and make you an easier target for anti-aircraft stations and enemy jets, so do your team a favor and fly everywhere solo. As expected, there's some strong language, so possibly not work safe.

Some oddities from Mitch01: A flash timewaster, It's SuperMario with a pump action shotgun! And, Prescription for change - The Drugs I Need - A rather concerning cartoon featuring dancing pills to show why you shouldnt take prescription drugs.

From B0mBjAcK: An interesting article about the Origins and Nature of the Internet in Australia. A little old but still interesting however.

TechReport checked out NCQ's effect on multitasking performance. However, though command queuing has long proven to be a valuable asset to SCSI drives faced with multi-user and enterprise-class workloads, the performance benefits of Native Command Queuing (NCQ) in desktop Serial ATA drives have been harder to illustrate.

Assembly '05 was a huge LAN party recently held in Europe - Metku were there. Every year there are thousands of gamers battling each others on the 3000 computer LAN and this year the national World Cyber Games (WCG) qualifications were held in this arena as well.

From Neevo: UnitedKeys is another keyboard with mini-displays on the keys for assigning icons. according to engadget this one may be available this year.

Gregor pondered along with this page, how many punch cards would be needed to store a 3-minute mp3 track. The 21 boxes of cards needed would be 5 feet 9 inches tall.

One interesting repercussion of the recent "10th planet" discovery is that people are reconsidering if we should call Pluto a planet after all. I think we should keep calling it a planet, even if we wouldn't classify it as one if it were discovered today.

Thetron spotted a little trick you might want to try next time you're in a hurry, and in an elevator.

Here's a lengthy but interesting report on Defcon, a recent security conference in Las Vegas. Anyone naive enough to access the Internet through the hotel's unsecured wireless system could see their name and part of their passwords scrolling across a huge public screen. It was dubbed the "The Wall of Sheep".

Mice, or mouses haven't changed that much over the years, but the new Apple Mighty Mouse is a bit different. "You’ll Really Click". From eroda.

Antivirus Security is something we all use on a daily basis. However, it is becoming clear that the Antivirus software could be the weak point in securing a system. Experts are warning that the popularity of antivirus software could turn the defensive measure into a security risk. More here.

FPS! Its all about Frame Rate. Want to have a kick-arse machine for games, then you need hooge FPS. CNET have found the Five Fastest off the shelf machines for gaming. Shame about the price of them though. I think with those prices I could put together two machines, each one just as quick... but they might not look quite so flashy.

It looks like our Solar System just got bigger with the discovery of a 10th Planet, although the claim of it being "A Planet" is under dispute. Either way, we have a hacker to thank for the release of the information.

I mentioned yesterday that the Beta 1 version of Microsoft's Internet Explorer v7 has seen improvement over previous versions. Over on Ars-Technica they ponder over whether the CSS support is good enough. Keep in mind that this is a Beta1 release.

ATI is all set to support the new OpenGL ES 2.0 specification. In this press release ATI talk about aiming it towards handheld devices.

In another press release, AMD have launched their Opteron 100 Series Processors with ECC unbuffered memory support. "Based on overwhelming customer demand in an increasing number of critical markets for one-way servers and workstations, AMD is expanding the types of memory supported by the AMD Opteron 100 Series processors. This new type of memory support is now the standard for the 100 Series".

For those people looking to get into Digital Photography but who want something more than a point & shoot camera, ZDNet have a Digital SLR Buyers Guide. They go over some of the Pros and Cons of an SLR camera and other considerations when deciding if a DSLR is for you.

Just a reminder to finish off with this morning. If you come across any news, reviews, or even just something amusing, send a link to news@overclockers.com.au and we'll post it if its news worthy.

After a bit of discussion, some members on our forum have organised an OCAU Iron Cook Off competition, similar lines along our Iron Photography events, except it's to do with food, not photos. Check out our Geek Food forum for all the information!

DVHardware have a very interesting read on Solid State Disks overtaking Hard Disk Drive storage in the near future.

Tankii sends in a timewaster that might keep you amused for a while, where you can target a website and destroy it...NetDisaster.

It's that time again. The OCAU Iron Photographer challenge is on again. With 57 entries for the July challenge its not going to be easy picking a favourite. Have a browse though the contenders and nominate your choice of the Top Ten. Once a Top Ten has been decided we will all have the chance to vote the winning entry. The August Challenge has begun so if you think you can go out and snap a shot to suit the theme, then feel free to enter the challenge.

For those new to digital photography, or thinking of taking the plunge then this article might be worth a read. "For anyone who considers their photography skills better than amateur, items such as automatic screen calibrators, portable image viewers and the like can go a long way towards achieving superior images".

Microsoft recently introduced a new system for acquiring updates to Windows XP. The idea was that unless you could prove that you legally owned your copy of XP then the Windows Update site would give you little more than the regular security improvements. It seems that it took a whole 24hrs for someone to find a way around it. I'm told that the full info on how to go about it can be found on the net. There seems to be at least a couple of ways to defeat it. Thanks eroda and Tony.

In other news, Overclocker Cafe' have posted up a roundup of the Intel Dual Core mainboard offerings from Foxconn. The roundup includes the i945 based Foxconn 945G7MA and 945P7AA, one of which is Micro ATX form factor. The third board in the round up is Foxconn's flagship product, the Foxconn 955X7AA which offers all that you would expect with a flagship product... at least that is what they tell me.

AMD has just released another processor to their dual-core 64-bit lineup: the 3800+ X2. This chip will be the lowest cost CPU on the dual-core product line, and as such will act as an "entry-level" chip to the dual-core market, and is aimed to compete against the Intel 820 and 830. Read for more specs and benchmarks. Read the Whole Article for all the info.

AMDboard have reached a milestone with 100 AMD socket 939 motherboard designs listed with many new links to photos and specifications. Here is a complete list of the motherboards they have in their list.

When talking about efficiency between single and dual core CPUs, who does it better ... Intel or AMD? T-Break try to find the answer.

CoolTechZone investigate ECS Hybrid Motherboards and look to the future of this series. "I am certain ECS won’t completely degrade the quality or limit the extreme BIOS options of its "Extreme" line of motherboards with the PF88, so expecting a 100 percent disappointing enthusiast board wouldn’t be true, or vice versa."

The E core revision of the AMD Athlon 64 processor features an enhanced integrated memory controller. XbitLabs discuss what has been improved compared with the previous controller version, namely, how the new Athlon 64 CPUs work with four memory modules and what benefits the DDR500 SDRAM support has brought these processors.

Printing web pages in Internet Explorer can be a real pain. Fortunately the Internet Explorer developers realized this. In IE7 Beta 1 you can already see some of the improved features and DVHardware give them a run-down.

Mark at A1 Electronics has put together a list of the current range of Intel Pentium 4, D dual-core, EE & M and Celeron D & M processors with all the details necessary from number, speed and cache etc to enable you to make an easy choice from the many different processor types, speeds and versions that are available.

The TechZone have a quick how-to on cleaning your laser printers. Full article here.

"Five Ways To Block SPAM" is the title of an article on BigBruin. I love reading anything which might help reduce the amount of rubbish I get in my email box each day. Full article Here.